"Sundance ... was created to find a safe haven for artists to become better and to make better cinema ... then we started this thing ... we called labs, which were basically workshops where filmmakers come and work on their scripts with mentors and there's a whole mentoring process ... very quickly after that [we] were making movies but they weren't getting seen anywhere so we needed to create a platform and that was the Sundance Film Festival and that's how it started" (source)

the festival has seen the likes of Paul Thomas Anderson, Alexander Payne and Tarantino all hone and develop their skills in an environment where risk-taking is encouraged and protected; a very different environment to Cannes or the Oscars ... where the focus is on subjective judgement by peers and winning awards.

I couldn't help but think and wish that there was a Sundance equivelant for our industry. the Cannes Festival of Creativity (which will soon see the great and good head off to the south of France for the annual networkathon) is basically our Oscars, and it has its place.

but there doesn't seem to be a counterpoint? we don't have a Sundance.

certainly in Australia the Media Federation Awards, like the B&T awards and Adnews awards, all follow the Cannes / Oscars template ... glitz and glamour as the campaigns and ideas judged to be the best allow the people who submitted them to have a fully deserved 15 seconds in the glare of the lights.

how awesome would it be if the above quote read:

"Incubator ... was created to find a safe haven for planners to become better and to generate better innovations ... then we started this thing ... we called labs, which were basically workshops where planners come and work on their ideas with mentors and there's a whole mentoring process ... very quickly after that [we] were creating innovation but they weren't getting seen anywhere so we needed to create a platform and that was the Incubator Ideas festival and that's how it started"

Wednesday, 09 March 2011

created by Michell Zappa, and sent to me by the awesome Mimi-ness of things, this speculative but intriguing visualisation of how technological developments could pan out presents an interesting question and exercise for brands and connections planning. how would you connect to people, given technological developments over the next year? what about in four years time?

perhaps a lot more social media, a bit less print? perhaps you'll have more sophisticated CRM management and real-time insight capture via social networks. so largely the same, but different.

the future may be more different than you currently imagine. Zappa's map suggests that within the next four years the following will be mainstream. not industry buzzed, geek adopted, first mover technologies. mainstream...

Social Graph, Tabs & Pads, and Multitouch. so far so Zuckerberg and Jobs. but what if you go a little further..? 3D printing, Linked data, Gesture and Speech Recognition, and Electronic Paper. within four years. this kind of technology - if adopted by the mainstream - would transform the retail environment. it would radically alter the opportunities we have to engage and interact with the conversations brands offer us.

it suggests a useful exercise. create a brand platform (I originally typed 'plan a brand campaign' but let's not go there right now) in 2015. imagine these technologies being on every high-street and in every home. how would it change what you create? what would be possible? what would you imagine for a world that could 3D print your product in their home? or interact with your communications by talking or gesturing to them?

then translate your ideas to right now... what could - at a stretch - be done in the next three months? what you do next is easy. you go do it.